


Worth the Price

by priestessamy



Category: Life Is Strange (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - No Powers, Alternate Universe - No Storm in Arcadia Bay (Life is Strange), F/F
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-23
Updated: 2021-03-08
Packaged: 2021-03-09 17:42:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 16,300
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27690178
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/priestessamy/pseuds/priestessamy
Summary: Max arrives in Arcadia Bay, excited not only to spend her senior year at Blackwell Academy, but also to reunite with her old best friend. Unfortunately, it turns out Chloe has been missing for several months, and the only lead she has is Chloe's distressed girlfriend. It would be easier if they could actually get along with one another.
Relationships: Brooke Scott/Juliet Watson, Rachel Amber/Maxine "Max" Caulfield, Taylor Christensen/Kate Marsh, Victoria Chase/Dana Ward
Comments: 37
Kudos: 80





	1. When I'm Without You

**MISSING**

Missing From: Arcadia Bay  
Date Missing: April 22, 2013  
**Other**  
Age: 18 years old  
Height: 5' 9"  
Hair: Blonde (dyed blue) Eyes: Blue  
Sleeve tattoo covering right arm  
with skull, flowers, ribbon, and butterflies  
  
  


Max stared at the words, and at the picture below them. She tried to will them to change, as if sheer hope could make it not true. But there was nothing to be done.

Chloe Price was missing, and the last time Max had seen her... Well, it was bad. She lied to her and ditched her, just as her father died. She never contacted her once in the interim, though she desperately wanted to on multiple occasions. And now she would never get the chance to apologize for that. But still, there had to be something she could do. Ripping one of the posters from the bulletin board, Max figured that she needed to see Joyce. Surely the woman would have the answers she needed.

There was a bus that ran from the school into town, and Max hurried to get to the stop. Unfortunately, after about thirty seconds, she started to get impatient. Instincts took over and before she knew it, her feet were carrying her down the sidewalk. She just took off running into town, focused only on going to the house she could reach while blind. Sure, she was pumping muscles and working lungs that hadn't been this active since her required gym classes. And she went running past a bunch of people watching confused at a teen girl hauling ass through their quiet suburban town in jeans and a dorky screen print shirt. All she had to do was find Joyce and everything would make sense.

Gasping for air, sweating like crazy, she finally reached her destination. Max made her way up to the door, trying her hardest not to double over and start wheezing. Her knocking was maybe a bit more frantic than she intended, but this was a freaking emergency.

A younger woman answered the door. It was not Joyce.

Her heart was hammering so hard Max could feel it in her ears. "Excuse me, is um... i-is Joyce home?"

"Joyce Price? I'm sorry, sweetie, we bought the house from her over the summer."

The only thing worse than that blood pumping too hard was the feeling of her heart skipping several beats. "Where... Where did she go?" In a different situation, Max might have been able to formulate some more coherent questions. _Did she move far away? Do you know her address? Or maybe her phone number?_ Instead, it came out sounding like a ten-year-old.

The pitying look on her face didn't make it feel any better. "Um, give me just a moment, I think I have the forwarding address around here somewhere..."

* * *

Max's body was still overloaded on adrenaline, and her lungs and legs still hurt. She sat on the fountain outside Blackwell, staring at two pieces of paper. One was the missing poster for her best friend, the other the new address for her best friend's mother. In Virginia. No way to reach her except snail mail. No one around who she had any connection to now. In truth, Max had been excited to be in a school where no one knew her and she could be anyone or anything. But now the possibility for a re-connection had been taken away from her and everything hurt.

There was one thing, one sliver of hope sitting in front of her, and she absolutely hated it: a phone number. The person that put the posters up had left their contact information on it. But this was the inverse of that situation, calling to ask them what they knew so far. Plus, calling a stranger on the phone was just... the worst. But Max had already run all the way to that house across the city, what was one more difficult thing before she gave up on this horrible day?

Her slightly trembling hand typed in the number and she brought the phone to her ear. "Please please please please..."

"Hello?"

 _Thank the lord!_ "Y-Yes, hi. Um, this might be kind of strange, but I'm calling about the missing person posters?"

There was a gasp from the other end of the line. She sounded fairly young, probably roughly the same age as Max. "You know something?"

"Er, actually, I was... Well. I-I'm an old friend of Chloe's, and..." Barely thirty seconds into this conversation and Max was already starting to tear up. "I guess I just figured whoever was willing to go around putting up posters all over the place must have known her pretty well."

A long pause followed that useless rambling. For a moment she worried that the call had disconnected, or worse, she'd been hung up on. "...holy shit, is this Max Caulfield??"

"Wh- You know me?"

"Chloe wouldn't shut up about you." There was some muffled sounds from the other end. "Where are you right now?"

"Are you familiar with Blackwell?"

The other girl laughed. "Uh yeah, I'm a student there."

Well, that kinda made sense. Max laughed softly too, mostly from nervous energy. "I'm at the fountain."

"Sandy hair, dorky screen print tee? Nine o' clock." Glancing to her left, Max saw a student approaching from another part of campus, a girl roughly her height with blonde hair and an impressive feather earring. "Incoming." Both of them hung up, and Max rose to meet the mystery girl. She was fairly certain she'd seen her around before, but it wasn't like she'd been around Blackwell long enough to know anyone except maybe Kate Marsh. Everyone else was still a stranger. "Damn, it really is you. Feels like meeting an urban legend or something..."

"I'm really not." _Why do I feel so intimidated right now??_ Max rubbed the back of her neck, clearing her throat softly. "So you were friends with Chloe?"

Her face contorted in a way that she didn't actually know how to read. "You really haven't talked to her in a while have you?" A glance at the poster and Chloe's picture told Max just how much she'd missed. She barely recognized her. "We were dating. I'm Rachel."

 _I'm going to need a few more years to process all this._ "You um... Huh?"

"Is it really so surprising?" Rachel crossed her arms, putting off a real aggressive aura. "Her childhood gal pal left her in the dust. I was there to pick up the pieces."

The multitude of implications in those few statements was enough to leave Max feeling winded for the second time in as many hours. Rachel's accusation might have been cruel, but it wasn't wrong. And she'd read Max hard enough to recognize that she and Chloe had some serious unresolved feelings. Feelings that might never be resolved now. "Are you going to help me understand what happened or just lay into me for the rest of the afternoon??"

The tension slowly drained out of her, and Rachel's arms dropped limply to her sides. "It's complicated. If you really want to know that bad, let's find somewhere more private to speak."

"We can go to my dorm if you're okay with it."

Her shoulders bobbed up and down, the hint of a shrug. "Yeah, fine, whatever."

* * *

Rachel was pacing Max's dorm, occasionally pausing to look at Lisa or one of the photos on her wall. "After that whole shitshow, things finally calmed down. I mean, everything was still on fire, and my birth mom left again, and my home life got... weird. But me and Chloe had each other. It was great." The way Rachel's voice trailed off, Max started to get the impression that maybe it was not actually great. "We had a full year together of... shenanigans and bullshit. But um..."

Max shrugged from her spot on the futon. She'd heard the whole story, what was the point of stopping now? "Look, just tell me. You already told me how you basically started a forest fire. What can be worse than that?"

"...I cheated on her."

On a cosmic scale, that wasn't necessarily 'worse'. But it did kind of hurt worse. Max was up on her feet and moving toward Rachel. "And you got on my ass because of what _I_ did?? Sounds like you're no better than me."

She expected her to get combative, up the ante. Instead, she started to shrink a little bit. "She's gone because of me. I-I screwed up and she left town without me. Probably went to LA just to rub it in my face. But on the off chance she's still around, I have to find her. I have to explain what happened?"

It wasn't her place to ask, but the question left her anyway. "Why did it happen? Who'd you hook up with?"

That had been a mistake, because Rachel immediately shut the proverbial door on this entire conversation. "Pretty sure I've already given you more than enough, Max. Just because you were friends, and she was my ex, it doesn't suddenly mean we're best buddies. You wanna find Chloe, you can do it yourself. I don't owe you shit." She stormed out of the dorm, shutting the literal door.

Max sunk down onto her bed and cuddled up to the Captain with a low sigh. Chloe was gone, Joyce was gone, she was alone, and the only person who could possibly help her or relate to her clearly thought she was an asshole. And frankly, Max kind of thought the same of her. Never mind the fact that she was maybe... a little bit jealous of her at the same time.

Chloe's girlfriend. The position she so desperately wanted. The possibility for that was decimated when Max let her fear get the best of her. A goodbye message on a fucking cassette.

Maybe this was what she deserved.

* * *

Somehow, going to the dining hall to get dinner with Kate had turned into a session of venting everything that happened that afternoon.

"Max, that's crazy."

Sighing, she began idly picking at her sandwich. "Right? It's bonkers."

Kate shook her head. "No, it's crazy that you're blaming yourself for all this. You were a kid. Scared and sad and worried about leaving the person you loved."

"Okay well! I still could have at least tried to send her a text or an email or whatever. That's pretty gross, isn't it?" Kate was way too forgiving, way too understanding. She wasn't even judging Max for being gay or anything. And it left her in a position where she was scrambling to find reasons to beat herself up. "I'm not even sure if I should bother trying to find Chloe. The police didn't find anything, and Rachel hasn't heard a word for months. What's the point?"

"No!" Thus far, Kate had been a fairly quiet and demure sort of presence. It was part of why Max liked her so much. Granted, it also helped that they were rooming right next to each other. But this sudden burst of righteous fury was new. "First of all, you can't give up hope! Hope is one of the most important things in the whole world!" She huffed and tried her best to look serious while drinking her glass of milk. "And! Secondly! I don't know much about what it's like being in love, but... I completely get why you were scared to talk to her again. The longer you wait, the more difficult it gets. And it started out pretty difficult to begin with." Max was suddenly aware of Kate's hand resting on top of her own. "Promise me you'll try and talk to Rachel again in a few days when you've both cooled off? You don't have to like her, or respect her. But you two both have the same goal, and Chloe deserves the chance to have her full story told."

Dammit. That was... a pretty coherent argument, all things considered. Plus there was just something about the way Kate looked and spoke that made you really want to believe there was something good in the world. "A-Alright. I'll try. For Chloe, not for her!"

She just laughed in response and pulled her hand away. "Good enough."


	2. Not Fashionable To Be This Hopeful

Rachel had foolishly assumed that after their explosive meeting, she might be able to avoid Max in the future. It hadn't occurred to her that her ex-girlfriend's ex-best friend might be a budding photographer who would share multiple classes with her. That made things... difficult.

To her credit, Max abided by the unspoken rule of their conversation that any further contact was to be brief and cordial. But that could have been as much due to her being a tiny little frail hipster waif as anything else. Maybe everything would be awkward for a while, but at least Rachel wouldn't have to put up with her anymore.

That happy peace lasted all of about three days. As they were leaving photography class - where the hell did Mr. Jefferson disappear off to anyway? - Max approached her with a soft clearing of her throat. "Rachel."

"Max." She adjusted her backpack and attempted to keep walking, but Max showed a bit of spine by standing directly in her path and holding eye contact. "Something I can help you with?" _She'd better accept that as a rhetorical question and continue on with her day._

She cleared her throat again, though this time it looked to be more of a nervous tic, judging by the way her shoulders hunched a little - as though she were trying to hide in on herself. "I owe you an apology."

_I should be happy about this. It would be a perfect chance to patch things up. Why the fuck does she bother me so much? I mean, I know the obvious answer to that, but still..._ "Yeah, you do." _Stellar work, Rachel. Really top-notch._

Max drew in on herself even more. "I lost the right to be indignant about how someone else treated Chloe when I chose to not contact her for five years. And while I'm sure what I have to say may not count for much, I can't imagine Chloe would be the type of person to just run away because of one... i-indiscretion."

Ew, did she have to phrase it like a fifty year old man? Rachel really wanted to hate Max, but she made it hard with how freaking earnest she was. "...c'mon. If we're gonna talk about this, let's at least not do it in the middle of the hall..."

The other girl just nodded dumbly, and the two of them started heading outside.

It was a strange sight, to see the quad now, compared to last spring. Once upon a time, there had been some very clear social divides, thanks in no small part to the Vortex Club's influence. But with Nathan called away by dear daddy to an even-more-private private school, that void never really got properly filled. The club splintered instead, and now the social order was completely in flux.

Rachel's eyes flitted over to the drama nerds, a group she had at one point been much more emphatically a part of. It brought with it a flood of memories and emotions. Steph and her super obvious schoolgirl crush. Victoria spiking her tea. Chloe filling in for Juliet - not to mention the stupid, idiot promises they made to each other as they started ad-libbing. And that had all been in the span of a single day!

Victoria was sitting and talking with Dana, both girls animated and lively. But Rachel really did not want to think about Victoria at the moment, for several reasons. She smirked at the sight of Hayden and Stella resting together in the grass, with her head atop his plentiful abs. They made quite the pair. And then there was Juliet and Brooke. They'd grown close during that same fateful _Tempest_ production. It wasn't all that long before they were going out. The two sharpest tacks in Blackwell, able to snoop and sleuth out just about anything they wanted.

A lightbulb went off in Rachel's head. "You got Joyce's address, didn't you??"

"Yeah, for all the good it does me..." Max mumbled, still quite the little sad-sack. Ugh, was she actually starting to feel bad for her?? Unfortunate.

"What if I told you we could probably get a phone number," she asked with a cocked eyebrow and a cocky smirk. Max's eyes lit up just a little bit, though you could tell she was tempering any further excitement. "I don't think Joyce wants to hear from me at the moment. But maybe she'd be happy to get a call from you?" It wasn't that the woman hated her, or distrusted her even. But she'd left so suddenly over the summer without so much as a goodbye that Rachel couldn't help thinking Joyce must have been less than pleased with her. No way of knowing for sure if she actually didn't want to hear from Rachel, or if she actually would be happy to hear from Max. But it was worth a goddamn try.

"Really?"

"Let's find out~"

* * *

Brooke made it look so easy that it was actually kind of embarrassing. "Don't be too hard on yourselves, it's not necessarily as easy as just... plugging this address into Google or anything. And I can't say whether or not this is strictly legal. But it works, so fuck it."

The two of them sat there while Juliet scrutinized them, and Rachel was suddenly aware of the optics of all this. She'd had one dalliance already that apparently caused Chloe to run away. Now she was getting close to another girl, her ex-girlfriend's ex-best friend. It didn't matter that she didn't want to spend any more time with Max than she absolutely had to. But from the outside, someone could certainly make _assumptions_. "So, I guess you finally decided to get off your ass and do something more than just covering the bay with posters."

"Yes, and I'll thank you to be a little less..." Here she gestured vaguely to Juliet. "... _you_ about this. Unlike you two, I'm not a 1930's detective. I didn't even realize Rose wasn't my mom until I _stumbled_ on that entire thing. Blame Max, she's the one who had the energy to run across the entire goddamn city just to get to Chloe's old house, and then called the number on the poster to _ask_ for information." Wait, shit, was that a compliment? In a backhanded sort of way, sure. Whatever.

"Doesn't matter. She probably hates me anyway."

Juliet's brown furrowed slightly. "So what? Let this be the way you make it up to her."

"Yeah!" Rachel added quickly, despite feeling very much the same way. "Chloe is used to bad luck at this point. She'll just be glad anyone is looking for her, even if it's her two least-favorite people around." _Who are you really trying to convince?_

Suddenly spinning around in her chair, Brooke offered a scrap of paper to Max. "And on that very happy and uplifting note, this is the only number associated with that address at the moment. I can't promise it won't go to an unconnected landline or whatever. But it's your best shot at the moment. Er... godspeed, I guess."

"Yeah, live long and may the force be shiny, so say we all," Juliet added with a shit-eating grin.

"I hate it when she does that. So she does it constantly."

* * *

Rachel had foolishly assumed that as soon as they got back to Max's dorm, she would immediately punch the number into her phone and make the call. Instead, she was pacing the room and decidedly... not doing that.

"You realize that you have to actually enter the numbers and hit the little green button right? It's a whole thing. I'm sure you know how a phone works."

At that, she clicked her tongue softly and continued to fiddle with the device. "I hate making phone calls enough as it is. This is... paralyzing. What if she wants nothing to do with me? What if she starts crying or something? What if she has bad news??"

"What if, what if, what if. Max, if you waste all your brain power on the 'what ifs' you're never going to get anywhere. Take the plunge, do something stupid, have a few regrets!"

Her eyes narrowed and she stared Rachel down for a moment or two. "Says the girl who started a devastating blaze."

Ouch. True, but still, ouch. "Touche. But the point still stands, we're not going to get anywhere if you don't do this." Rachel took in a deep breath, then let it out as a long sigh. "If you absolutely can't do it, then I will."

With a pout, Max slumped onto her futon. "No. You're right. I need to just do it. Ugghh this is gonna suck." Her hands were visibly trembling as she typed the number in, sent the call, and put it to speaker.

Ring.

Ring.

Ring.

Ring.

Just when it seemed like it would go to voicemail, the other line clicked and a familiar voice replied. "Hello?"

"J-Joyce Price? I-It's Max. Max Caulfield." She gnawed on her lower lip, worrying it away below her teeth.

There was another distressing pause. "Max!" Another pause. "Oh... Max. I'm so sorry sweetie, you must be calling about Chloe."

"Joyce, what happened? Where did she go?"

Goddamn this woman was good at pausing. Rachel realized after a moment or two that she was holding her breath waiting for a response.

"...Max, a lot has changed. Too much, I'm afraid. That town ain't what it used to be. The bad people get to do whatever they want, and the good people have to pay for it. You want to know the truth, I wish you had stayed in Seattle."

"Okay, well- Well I'm not in Seattle, Joyce. I'm in Arcadia Bay, and that's not exactly going to change any time soon. So what happened??"

She couldn't keep silent any longer. It didn't matter if the woman hated her, she had to say something out loud. "Please! Joyce, I love her, and she's gone, and I just want her back! Give me something, anything, whatever small scrap you can, and that will be enough!" She sniffled, and felt a hot tear running down her cheek. "Please..."

"Rachel?" You could hear the shock in her voice, plain as day, followed by another of those interminable pauses. "You two girls are both on this hunt, huh? Chloe don't have much in that town, but what she has, she's got a lot of it." A long sigh came out through the phone. "You're not gonna let this go, are you? Fine. I can't say nothin', but the same isn't true for the other people in her life. Maybe you should start with my no-good ex-husband."

Max looked beyond confused, and it took Rachel a moment to remember just what had changed in five years. "...William??"

Surprisingly, Joyce actually chuckled at that. "No, though if you find a way to talk to him, you be sure to let me know. David Madsen. Last I knew, he was running security for Blackwell. He still around?"

Rachel felt legitimately stupid. Of course. David had been such a thorn in Chloe's side from the very moment the two girls had gotten to know each other. Surely he had to know something, especially since Joyce was quite determined to remain tight-lipped. "Yeah, though I haven't seen him as much as I did last year. But that's something at least." She gave her best effort at a pause of her own. "Joyce... I'm sorry. This is all my fault, and I... I understand if you hate me. I get it."

"Still the dramatist, huh? Rachel baby, if I thought for one second this was actually your fault, you'd know it. I don't blame you for nothin' except being a stupid teenager with an idiot hormonal brain. Now, I've probably already said too much. Goodbye, girls. Please don't call again."

"Wait!" Max called out, but the call was already cut. The two of them sat there in silence, unsure what to even say, with no idea if this was something you could even consider a victory.


	3. Reasons for Living Never Come Cheap

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm going to be sprinkling little intermissions throughout this story to look at what other characters are up to. This time around, Kate and Taylor.

"I don't think I have it in me to grill another person today. Do you... want to pick this up tomorrow?" Max felt a little bit bad for tapping out so soon, but that single conversation with Joyce had been fairly crushing. She was gone, talking in circles, giving almost nothing helpful. And if this David guy did the same, it was bound to leave her an emotional wreck. All of those 'what if' questions from earlier were flooding back into her mind, stronger than before.

Thankfully, Rachel seemed to be on roughly the same wavelength. "Yeah. I think I'm going to need a good night's sleep before I try to have a conversation with the step-d- David Madsen." Max wasn't entirely sure what she was about to say there, but it seemed like it was probably some kind of inside joke. And she also wasn't ready for a reminder that Chloe had gone through so much in her life without her old best friend there. So many things she'd missed. "Hey."

Max snapped out of her wallowing and looked curiously at Rachel. "Um, yeah?"

"I was like... shitty. Yesterday. And also today. So like... I don't know. I shouldn't have been."

Huh. That was unexpected. "Apology accepted."

The blonde hopped up to her feet and started heading for the door. "Wasn't an apology!" She was halfway out, then stopped herself again. "Two o' clock, outside the security office. See you there."

* * *

Kate glanced around her at the empty classroom, giving a soft sad sigh. She should have known that starting up a Bible study wouldn't get much foot traffic, but surely someone would have shown up by now! It was now ten minutes after the designated starting time, and she felt like admitting defeat and heading back to her dorm.

She'd just started to put her Bible back in her bag when the door latch clicked. Kate's immediate assumption was that someone else was coming to use the room, or maybe a member of the cleaning staff doing their usual duty. What she never would have expected was to look up and see Taylor Christensen. Still, it was more than likely a mistake. "Hey, I'll be out of the way in a second."

"Oh, did I miss the study?" She whipped out her phone to check the time. "Thought it was still going on."

"No one showed up..." Kate muttered, before suddenly realizing what she was saying. "Er, well, until now I suppose? If you're okay with it just being us, then I'm happy to do this."

Taylor just gave an easy smile and sauntered her way over to sit down in one of the other chairs nearby. "As long as you're okay with me asking annoying questions."

"Bible study is all about asking annoying questions. Hit me with your best shot." For as often as Kate was nervous and worried in the rest of her life, this was the one thing where she felt confident and composed.

It seemed like maybe Taylor had noticed this as well, because one of her eyebrows quirked up slightly. "My goodness, Kate, where have you been hiding your other side this past year? Fascinating."

"Alright alright, let's keep the focus on Jesus, not me."

"Fine." The cheeky smile lingered for a moment or two before finally fading away. "Why um... Why does stuff suck so hard for no reason? Like, I get that people do bad things and all that. But what about stuff like natural disasters or diseases and stuff?"

Oof. Jumping right into the deep end. Kate should have expected as much. "That can be a pretty tough conversation to have. You don't have to tell me, if you're not comfortable, but it might help to know more of the specifics."

In many ways, Kate wasn't prepared for her Bible study to suddenly turn into a full therapy session. Before she knew it, Taylor was telling her the full story of her mother having problems, her diagnosis, her surgery, and more. You would never know it seeing her around Blackwell, she seemed so carefree and happy. Apparently she was also dealing with anxiety layered on top of that. It quickly became apparent that Taylor needed a good deal more than to discuss the problem of theodicy with a teenage girl.

"Er... the truth is that I... I don't really know, Taylor. I wish that I could, that I had all the answers for you." She sighed and flipped through her Bible slowly. "But some of the writers actually raised similar questions, and some of them reached things almost approaching answers. If you'd like, maybe I can prepare some things and we can talk more about it next time?"

In spite of the heavy topic, and the soul-bearing, Taylor did seem to brighten up a bit. "That would seriously be great!" This seemed like the logical end of the meeting, and the point where she would leave the room with a traditional 'see you next week' or the like. But she remained sitting there, watching Kate carefully. "Would you like to get some food? I just feel like I owe you for putting up with me dumping all this in your lap."

"O-Oh, you don't owe me anything!" Still... Taylor was offering, and it would have been rude to turn her down. And she was getting pretty hungry. "But I suppose if you wanted to simply have a friendly dinner together, I wouldn't object to that."

* * *

This was a meal that never would have happened last semester. Back then, the social order had been strict and firmly maintained. But then, one day, Nathan announced to the Vortex Club that he was leaving Blackwell at the end of the school year. Victoria reacted... poorly to that news and drew more into herself. Without the two pillars of the club to support it, the damned thing fell apart.

Sure, Taylor still hung out with Courtney on occasion, and it wasn't as though she'd abandoned Vic, but there were some definite voids in the fallout. Everyone was adrift, to some degree. It didn't help that Taylor's mom was going through this whole spine thing, adding to Taylor's emotional spiral. Which was how she found herself in a goddamn bible study, talking with goddamn Kate Marsh, and finding it... surprisingly nice.

So she invited her to get dinner. It was nothing fancy, just a couple burgers at the Two Whales. But doing as much with someone new made it feel fresh.

It was hard to trace their conversation thus far, but somehow they'd gotten onto the subject of Chloe Price - or more accurately Max and Rachel's attempts to hunt her down. Taylor nodded her head sadly and sighed. "I don't know, I feel like best-case scenario, they find her but... she doesn't want to be found. Tragic, right?"

"Hm. It doesn't help that they're both carrying such massive weights on their shoulders... Apparently Rachel is pretty guilty?"

Taylor frowned, idly pushing a few crumbs around on her plate before sipping at her milkshake. "Hm, I mean, I can at least understand why Rachel would think that. Chloe went missing right after-" _Ah shit._ She cut herself off, already feeling like she'd said too much.

To her credit, Kate just gave a beatific smile, tilting her head slightly. "Oh, i-it's okay, I didn't hear a thing."

This was weird. She was so used to people who immediately went 'OMG gossip!' and then you spill things and feel super guilty about it after. But that wasn't Kate. Which, thank goodness, because Taylor had basically used the poor thing like free therapy earlier. And maybe it was the fact that Kate was so clearly capable of being silent that she didn't feel quite so bad speaking up again. "Rachel... hooked up with Vic at a party like... a week or two before Chloe dropped off the map. There are rumors floating around that she might _actually_ be the reason she ran for the hills. Or LA, more likely."

Stunned, the other girl's head dipped down a little bit as she sipped from her glass of water. "I never heard about that."

"Yeah, because you don't hang out with the shitty kind of people that I used to..." she muttered, only to realize what she'd just said, gasping brightly. "Sorry, Kate, I'm sure you don't want to hear me dropping curse words and speaking ill of others..."

Another smile, another shrug. "Not a problem, Taylor. I try to avoid that stuff, but I also try to not begrudge other people for how they live their lives."

In a way, she was a little bit surprised to hear that. People tended to assume that Kate was the sort of person to look down on others, judging them for being sinful perverts or whatever. Today was a day about learning things. "Damn, you're like... an _actual_ nice person." She blushed at that, which was kind of really nice to see, not to mention being the cause of it. _Ew, get it together, girl. No way in hell Blackwell's saint would be that kind of girl._

"I'm just... me."

"Hah, that you are." Taylor idly swirled her straw around in slow circles. "I have to admit, I'm looking forward to next week. Curious to see what you manage to dig up for me."

That made her brighten up a bit. "I'm looking forward to it too! Oh, but, um, prepare yourself for not getting too many simple, straight-forward answers. I wish that were something I could provide, but it doesn't feel true, I guess. The things worth knowing don't come easy."

Maybe that was something she was hoping for when she walked into that room. But not anymore. Taylor already felt better, and she sort of knew instinctively that Kate wouldn't lead her astray. Shaking her head, she pushed herself to stand up from the booth, putting a wad of bills on the table. "C'mon, let's get back to campus."

* * *

Kate was at least able to get back into her room and safely behind the closed door before completely losing her cool.

It would have been stressful enough just doing a Bible study with a single other person who was going through some difficult personal stuff. Add on top of that, it was someone who she barely knew. But during the course of their time together, it was also swiftly dawning on Kate that certain things she'd managed to bury were coming to the surface again.

She was developing a crush, and that was _not good_.


	4. Some May Fear Committed Lives

"Max, there's something I need to tell you before we do this..."

Not a great start to everything. Max swallowed and tried her best to keep walking at an easy pace while they made their way down the hall. "Um. Okay?"

"David could be a real asshole, sometimes. He was the bane of Chloe's existence pretty much from the first time I got to know her. The day he proposed to Joyce, I had to basically talk her down from a panic attack." Rachel brushed her fingers back through her hair and sighed wistfully. "He uhh... David would hit her sometimes. Not constantly, but more than once. I just... I didn't want that to come up out of nowhere and completely floor you in the middle of us grilling him."

She might have appreciated the consideration saving her from that level of shock in the midst of a stressful experience. But here and now, that was still incredibly hard to hear. "...fuck." Just one more thing added to the list of things she'd missed, things she wasn't around to help her get through. "Um, well, thanks for warning me." She walked up to the door and knocked softly, bracing herself for whatever insanity was about to unfold.

"Come in." The two of them shared one last nervous look before stepping through the door. "Oh, uh, Rachel. And... it's Maxine, right?"

"Max is fine." She hoped her voice came out fairly cool, but it shook more than she would have liked. "We don't want to take up too much of your time, Mr. Madsen. I'll get right to it, we're looking for any information we can get about Chloe. Something weird is going on and we're getting to the bottom of it."

His face fell, and he shot a glare at Rachel. "So now you've roped this poor girl into your hunt?"

"Give it a rest, _David_. I was just putting up posters, and then _she_ roped _me_ into being more proactive about this. Which is more than I can say about literally anyone else around here..."

"I knew Chloe longer than either of you!" It took a moment to realize that Max was the one exploding. "And she's gone and I just want her back! So no posturing and no dancing around it. I just want to know that she's okay. Tell me whatever you know." Her voice was nearly cracking now. "Please..."

She was blown away at the feeling of a hand on her shoulder, and just barely managed to meet Rachel's eyes for a split second. "We talked to Joyce, and we know that something is massively wrong. If you ever cared even one iota about Chloe, then talk to us."

"...hell. This is no good. You girls..." He gave a weary sigh and reached down into his desk, fishing around for a few moments, shuffling papers aside before finally pulling out a tattered notebook. On the cover was clearly written _Chloe's Journal, Do Not Read, David This Includes You_. "This damn thing. Chloe made more than a few entries about the times when I... When she got out of hand and I reacted poorly. Joyce didn't want it, and I was supposed to burn it. Glad I didn't. If you talked to her mother, then you know I'm not saying anything either." Max was about to reach out and take it when he pulled it back a few inches. "There's still time for you to turn away. Go back out there and focus on classes and graduating."

Rachel didn't even miss a beat. She leaned in and snatched the book out of his grasp. "Fuck you. You don't get to act all high and mighty after what you did. Come on, Max." She grabbed Max's hand and started dragging her away without warning.

Waiting at least a few minutes until they were away from the office, Max finally spoke up. "Uhh... where are we going anyway?"

"American Rust. I'm going to need a some weed and alcohol if we're gonna dissect this."

* * *

It was strange to think just how much Max was getting up to in just her first few days back in Arcadia Bay. Hunting down her old friend, hanging out in a junkyard, her first drink, her first joint. This was... a lot.

Neither of them had actually opened the journal yet. It just sat there between them on an old cable spool, a gravity well, daring them to investigate it. Rachel eyed it with a shaky breath, reaching out and gently brushing her fingertips over the surface, tracing the crappy lettering. "Max... I-I talked a big game in Madsen's office but... I don't know if I'm ready to do this. Everyone is doing their best to make it clear that this doesn't have a happy ending. You know? And I keep thinking about how the last time I talked with Chloe we had a huge blow-up. What if that was-" She cut herself off before she could finish that particularly gruesome thought.

"The last time I talked with Chloe, I didn't tell her I was leaving forever. And then I left her a goddamn cassette. Neither of us are really what Chloe deserved, but it sounds like we're all she's got now. So... I'm going to follow this all the way down if I have to."

She smirked softly at that, which felt like some kind of progress. Moreso when she softly muttered, "it was Victoria Chase."

"Wait, what?" The answer should have been obvious, but after all that they'd learned so far, Max had kind of forgotten about what Rachel revealed during their first conversation.

"I got... bored. And as I say that out loud, I immediately hear what a massive bitch I sound like. But Chloe had a way of being very... content with life the way that it was. She'd dropped out and she wasn't doing anything. And I went to a party and just... I needed something different. I... I got wasted and made out with Victoria. Word got back to Chloe, and that's when we had our blow-up. She called me a bitch, I called her a burnout, it was... bad."

You couldn't really say that Max was relieved to hear any of that. It was mostly just painful. But at least some of the gaps were being filled in. "I'll read it, if you're not ready to. Filter out the necessary information from the painful stuff." Not that long ago, Max was sure she would hate this girl. Now she was empathizing with her.

Rachel just shook her head. "No. I fucked up, I have to face it." Finally she picked the notebook up and began flipping through it.

* * *

_Had a fight with Rachel today. Bad one. She hooked up with Icky Vicky at a party, which... gross. The least she could have done was pick someone a little less horrible._

_Get it together, Chloe, that's not the point._

_I said some shit that I already regret. Rachel's incredible. She's put up with so much of my shit. And I've just been sitting around like a lump. Fuck._

_There's only one answer. We've gotta get to LA. I need to prove to Rachel that I'm not a complete and total fuck-up. God dammit I love her so fucking much. I just need the money to pay Frank back, then enough to cover gas and a few months of rent, that kind of thing._

_First things first, see what I can get out of Frank. Hell, maybe he'll let me be a gopher or something to pay back my debt. If all else fails, well..._

_Who has more money than a Prescott?_

* * *

Rachel was sobbing uncontrollably. It wasn't what she'd been expecting at all, and yet it was so very... Chloe. But the fact that she was effectively shrugging off a fight and focusing on how to fix it? That was... _not_ Chloe. And somewhere in the knot of complicated emotions, it pierced Rachel right through the middle of her chest, spearing her heart, filling her with a complicated mix of love and longing and regret and sadness and much more. Her girlfriend should have been furious. This journal entry should have been full of rage and anger. The words "I fucking hate her" should have been scrawled again and again. The fact that they weren't meant Rachel had lost someone she definitely didn't deserve. And whether Chloe was gone or _gone_ , she'd screwed up big-time.

She was suddenly aware of Max shifting to sit closer to her, gently putting a hand on her arm. "What's the matter? Is everything okay??"

"I-I-I-" she tried to get out through all her whimpering. "I'm su-such an asshole. And she's so amazing, a-and where did she go!? Why didn't she fu-fucking tell me!?" Max jumped a little as a lot of built up confusion and frustration came barreling out of her. Her hand shot out and grabbed the nearby bottle of shitty vodka by the neck, and she took a long drink from it.

You could see it in Max's face, she was trying not to freak out herself. But she was giving it a damn good effort. She even began patting Rachel's arm like she was dealing with a child throwing a tantrum. "She said it herself. Either this Frank guy knows something, or maybe this... Prescott? Do either of those names ring a bell?"

They damn sure did. "Frank is the local dealer. I literally just saw him like a week ago. I swear to god, if he's known something this entire time and didn't tell me, I'm going to murder him."

"O-Okay, well, before we go threatening bodily harm to a drug dealer, what about Prescott? Who's that?"

"It's a local family, super wealthy. They own like... half the town. Their son Nathan was a student at Blackwell up until last year. He's supposedly doing his senior year at a school that is inexplicably more elite than this one. My theory is he had a nervous breakdown and went to some kind of executive treatment center to recover." Truth be told, it did feel good to divert some of her energy to thinking about this logically. Not to mention hating on Nathan, which was a sort of therapy all its own. "Are you... seriously thinking about just hunting them both down and grilling them?"

"We've already done that with both Joyce and David. Why stop now?" Max shrugged and gently brushed her thumb back and forth across Rachel's arm, which was kind of soothing. "You already know this Frank guy, so talking to him should be relatively easy. As for Nathan... I-I don't know, his family must still be in town, right?"

A thought struck Rachel that she absolutely hated with every fiber of her being. "There is someone who might know how to reach him without going through his family. Uhhh... Victoria was basically like a sister to him. If anyone would have his contact information, it'd be her."

Max at least had the good sense to recognize the inherent risk in her proposition. "You don't have to..."

"Maybe not, but we can't keep avoiding each other for an entire year. And if she doesn't give us anything useful, we can always regroup and strategize." She was fully aware that she was now speaking very much in terms of 'we' despite being quite combative with Max just a day before. But the girl had proven herself, and her dedication to finding Chloe. And maybe it was true that neither of them was exactly a great person. But at this point, it was a matter of principle.

Everyone else was content to let her fall off the face of the earth. But not her, and not Max. They would bumble their way through this whole thing if they had to. She gently laid her hand on top of the other girl's with a long sigh. "Like you said. We're all she has now. We see this through, no matter what."


	5. Find the Diamond Inside

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Been a while since I updated! Decided to ease back into it with more fluff. So here's the return of Kate and Taylor!

"Not even back in my hometown a week and I'm about to speak with a drug dealer. Is this my coming-of-age tale? Tragic..." It was so weird to be on a beach that she'd visited a hundred times and be in a situation so drastically different from her entire life up until now.

Rachel just rolled her eyes and huffed softly. "I get that this is a very confusing moment for you but can you please just like... be cool while we're doing this? Frank is scummy, but he's weirdly okay sometimes. Like I get it, I'm a waspy white girl too. But it's going to be okay, we're on a mission, not buying heroin off the guy."

She... had a good point. Max sighed softly and nodded her head in understanding. "Yeah. Okay."

"Dude even took in a puppy rescued from one of those garbage dog-fighting rings. Just... be like the awkward person at a party and focus on the dog."

That probably could have felt like a mean jab, but it actually did help Max feel less nervous and even got a laugh out of her. "Never been to a party before but I would be willing to bet I am that person."

For just a moment, the blonde actually paused and looked over at her intently. "Okay, once we figure all this, that's the next thing on our to-do list."

It was a stupid thing to think. And it wasn't an active thought, some passive thing from the depths of her brain. _Oh. We have a to-do list now. Both of us. That's interesting._ She did her best to let the idea pass her by without too much consideration. But it had most definitely been noted. "Okay, but first I'm going to need about a week to sleep this off, whatever happens."

She chuckled and nodded. "Yeah, for sure."

* * *

As promised, Frank actually was a pretty nice guy, all things considered. He sat leaning back in a lawn chair with a practiced easiness. His dog - the oddly named Pompidou - sat snoozing in his lap. The issue was that he didn't seem to know much at all. "Yeah, Chloe came to see me, asking for a job, anything she could get. And I almost did it. Always wanted my own gopher, just sit back and be the middle-man. But she'd already racked up a massive debt and I didn't trust that she might not end up with even more." He released a heavy sigh and brushed his greasy fingers through his greasy hair. "Shit, maybe I should've done it anyway. Might not be having this conversation otherwise."

Max immediately shook her head. "I don't think it's that simple. Y'know, blaming ourselves for small or big mistakes." Chloe could have always looked for a normal job. Rachel could have not gone to that party. Max could have nutted up and told her friend the truth when she had the chance. "All the maybes and what ifs in the world aren't going to do anything. Look, Frank, it's been... strangely okay meeting you. But if this is a dead end then we've gotta keep going."

Surprisingly, he began to laugh at that, shaking his head in bewilderment. "Damn kid. Maybe the two'a you got what it takes to find her. And uh... hey." Max was already in the process of standing up from her lawn chair, but did pause long enough to see what else Frank had to say. "If- When you find her. Tell her Frank said she's a piece of shit."

Something about that, the tiny offering of normality and friendly ribbing... It made Max feel a little more okay. "Will do."

As they walked back to Rachel's car, the blonde sighed softly. "Not looking forward to these next few steps. But um... Is it cool if I do this part alone? Vic and I probably need to talk about a few other things and... Well, you don't really need to be there for that. Cool?"

Max shrugged, trying to pass off how insanely grateful she was to not be in the same room as that intense drama. "Cool."

* * *

Kate couldn't yet decide if running into Max in the hall was a blessing or a curse. "Hey! You look nice." Glancing down at herself, she wasn't totally sure what made Max say that. Sure, she'd maybe spent an extra few minutes on her makeup, and she was wearing a dress instead of her usual skirt-sweater combo. But she wasn't exactly overdoing it. Definitely not. This was normal, and fine. And Max was definitely imagining things.

"I don't know, I guess I just felt like being cute today."

"Awh! You're cute every day Kate!"

That made her blush, and also made it obvious ten times over that she desperately wanted someone else to say those same words to her. Not that it would ever happen. But her hopes were lifted nonetheless.

Despite agreeing to meet a week later, she'd gotten a text from Taylor asking if they could move their discussion up a little bit since she was eager to have some kind of answer. So they were going to meet up at the Two Whales again to study and get some food. And while Kate understood on an intellectual level that she was reading into things way too much, she just couldn't help herself. "A-Anyway, I need to head out soon. Since Taylor's the only one interested in Bible Study, we figured we might as well do it somewhere we can also get grub."

Max smiled at that in a way that spoke volumes. Knowing, smug, excited, understanding, amused... It was a lot for such a simple tweak of the mouth. It opened Kate's world up, raw and unshielded and seemed to say 'I see you, and I know you, and that's very cute, and maybe a little sad, and also very relatable.' Her face felt hot, and for the first time ever she did not want to be around Max Caulfield for any longer than she absolutely had to. "I'm really glad you have someone to do that with. I know how much it means to you!"

"Exactly! Exactly. So I should finish getting ready and then catch the bus. Um, but thank you for your enthusiasm, and for the compliment." She didn't wait for any sort of formal farewell, reaching for her doorknob and rushing inside her dorm room to hide. She'd been found out, and if Max saw it, then Taylor probably would too. She'd be revealed for the hypocrite she was. Anything she had to teach would be useless and she'd just be the pathetic girl who misread hanging out as some kind of date. So Kate moved as fast as she could, wiping away the makeup and swapping out her dress for a comfy sweater and some jeans, anything to say 'This is low-key and not super important to me except as it pertains to my Christian duty.'

Yes, this was the ticket. A totally dressed-down Kate Marsh, nothing interesting about her in the slightest. As God intended. She picked up her Bible and her notebook and rushed outside to catch the bus into town.

* * *

Taylor felt as though she'd prepared for most of this pretty well. She'd even worked together with Courtney - who was shockingly supportive - to make sure her outfit and makeup were both understated but eye-catching. A slightly shimmery top and jeans that were a touch tight with rips in tactical locations. Tiny wings on her eyeliner and a bit of green in her eyeshadow to really stand out. She looked incredible. Hell, even the phone call was a tactical gambit, hoping to throw poor Kate off her game and leave her at least a little bit flustered.

If this didn't turn Kate Marsh at least a tiny bit gay, nothing would.

There was something she hadn't properly accounted for, though. Kate did not show up in her usual regalia. No, she was massively dressed down, without a hint of makeup, not even that simple coating most girls went for in day-to-day life. A sweater that was maybe a little baggy and frumpy, jeans that seemed to defy anatomy by changing the curves of her legs.

And it all came together to create this look that was... upsettingly pretty. Natural in a way that Taylor would have had to work her ass off to create. It seemed almost impossible. It was infuriating. It was kind of hot.

She tried, god help her. She really tried to keep up with the conversation. After all, Kate was doing an amazing job, showing her stuff she had never even heard of from the bible. Relatable verses about how sometimes life could feel meaningless, people actually cursing god for their suffering. Things that spoke to her and made her wish she was more attentive. "Seriously, this is incredible. I had no clue this stuff was in there. Kinda nice to know that even _these_ people were like... 'hey, shit is fucked up sometimes.'" Taylor groaned internally at her urge to default to base language. Like such words should never fall on Kate's ears or something. But she seemed unperturbed.

"Mhmmm, people tend to just think of Moses, Noah, Jesus, and Revelation. But it can actually get really dark in places. And, I don't know, it's comforting in a sort of confusing way, if only because you feel heard and seen."

While they talked, Taylor was mentally rewriting her plans. If her original ideas were being sent to the wayside, she needed to improvise. Reaching out, she lightly rested her hand on top of Kate's and looked directly into her eyes. "Thank you for all this. It means a lot." And she meant that. It said a lot, that all she could think about was how cute Kate was, but still managed to get something out of this in spite of her selfishness.

But then she got her first good sign. Kate flushed, heavily, and looked away and then down at their hands. She didn't pull away. With what seemed to be a great amount of effort, she finally brought her eyes back around to lock with Taylor's again, lips curling into a bashful smile. "I-It was my pleasure. I love getting to share this stuff with other people, and I like helping, and... Well, it's also been nice getting to know you."

So she went for it. With a single fluid movement, she adjusted her hand slightly and laced their fingers together. "You wanna get out of here?"

Her eye movements got much more rapid, her blush even heavier. She looked down at their hands, back to Taylor's eyes, over to her bible, and finally back to Taylor one more time. "I um. I do. Is that okay?"

Fireworks went off in her brain and it took everything Taylor had to keep from doing any outward celebrating then and there. "C'mon~" They did the usual dance of paying for their meal and heading for the door, getting into her car, heading back to school. It was fraught with tension, naturally, but otherwise uneventful except for the small fact that Kate allowed Taylor to continue holding her hand while she drove. Probably unsafe, decidedly adorable. She sort of expected she would at least release it for the walk across the quad, but she never did.

There was little conversation, they simply walked through the dorm building and right into Taylor's room. It was only after the door closed that Kate dutifully asked the obvious question while hesitantly pulling her hand away. "So... what now?"

If this were someone else, Taylor might have crashed against them, pressing against the door and going right for the killer french kiss. Somehow that seemed wrong here. So she sat down on the edge of her bed and gently pet the spot next to her on the comforter. "Here..." Kate sat down next to her and she moved cautiously to bring her hand against her cheek. "I'm going to kiss you now." It wasn't really a question, but it kind of was. She got a small nod of agreement, which was all she needed before bringing their lips together in what may have been the most chaste kiss of her life. But somehow that felt appropriate, and it was a very good kiss.

What shocked her, what truly knocked Taylor off her proverbial feet, was what happened next. Kate leaned into it a little more, and was the first to part her lips, experimentally grazing her tongue against her lips. So of course she had to join her in opening in a warm greeting.

The next thing she knew, the two of them were horizontal. And it seemed rude to linger on any details beyond that, if only because they seemed too unreal to believe, as though it might break the spell.


	6. For Her To Be Free

Rachel stood outside Victoria's door, trying to summon up the willpower to actually knock. The good news was that this gave her a chance to hear that Victoria wasn't alone in her room - most likely spending time with Dana. The bad news was that she really couldn't walk away from this now. Her and Max - and it really had become her and Max lately, which was something she was expending another chunk of mental real estate ignoring with all her might - were trying to solve this as fast as possible.

So eventually there was not much else to it but to push past her nerves. Rachel knocked against the solid wood door in a way she hoped was firm and confident. There was some shuffling inside, but Dana did open the door relatively quickly. It was with some small gratitude she saw that she hadn't interrupted anything between the two. That would have only made this that much more awkward. Victoria was stretched out on her bed with some manner of reading.

"Hey. Can I talk to Victoria for a second? Um, alone?"

Dana, to her credit, crossed her arms and looked very possessive and protective in that moment. "Whatever it is, I think I'll stick around."

Victoria, to her credit, seemed to appreciate the aggressive chivalry with a hint of jealousy, but stepped in before things got awkward. "Babe. Everything's fine, she just needs like... a minute and then we're good, right?" She held Rachel's gaze for a moment, looking to her for confirmation that this wasn't going to be some long, drawn-out bullshit. Which, hopefully it wasn't.

Dana also locked on to Rachel's eyes, staring her down for a second before silently taking her leave.

Finally she was able to shut the door and lean against it, catching her breath. "Wasn't expecting that..."

"Yeah," Victoria said, somehow managing to be both apologetic but also incredibly turned on by Dana's attitude. "So. What did you want, anyway?"

"Well... It's two things. I can either start with the awkward-bad one or the awkward-good one." Rachel was still leaning up against the door for now, leaving a very cautious amount of space between the two of them for now. There was every chance in the world Victoria might suddenly change her mind.

She just shrugged and sighed. "Start with the bad, get it out of the way."

"Okay. Um. Max and I have been hunting down where the hell Chloe disappeared off to. It kinda looks like... Nathan might have been one of the last people to see her. And since he's gone away to his 'exclusive new boarding school' I thought that you might know how to get in contact with him..."

Victoria was still gripping the book in her hands, attempting to nonchalantly continue reading while holding this conversation. Here, though, she put the book down and looked more intently toward Rachel. "Well at least you're being straightforward with your intentions and, frankly, your insinuations."

"I'm not trying to insinuate anything, Victoria!" she lied. But then again, other people were lying to her, or hiding behind half-truths, and it was just getting so goddamn exhausting. "I'm following the evidence. Even if he only had a brief, uneventful conversation with Chloe, there's always the chance that she let something slip about what she'd be doing next. That's all I need, a breadcrumb, okay?"

She didn't say a word, she just stood up and went to her desk, retrieving a small piece of paper, then a second blank sheet and a pen. After a bit of scribbling, Victoria folded up the second paper and made to hand it to Rachel, only to pull back at the last second. "This... This is... it. All other bullshit is fully and completely trivial. But this? You take any information you get to your fucking grave, got it? Nathan is still my best friend, and I don't want to hear you spreading rumors, and I definitely don't want to know whatever fucked up shit you find out. Are we clear?"

"We're clear." She did her best to say so with full confidence. What the hell was on that sheet of paper??

Victoria passed it over, then popped her hands on her hips. "And what's the second thing that's so damn important you had to interrupt my time with my girlfriend?" It was kind of... sweet, to hear Victoria say that. And she seemed proud to do so. It was the first time Rachel had heard her make it explicit.

"I wanted to apologize." This seemed to be enough to shock her out of saying anything clever, so she just stood there silently. "I, like... used you. At that party. I went there looking to escape for a night, and I dragged you down with me so I wouldn't have to be alone in fucking up. And that was super shitty. So... I'm sorry." She paused for a moment, and then tried to extend a second olive branch to be on the safe side. "You and Dana are really cute together."

That finally got Victoria to crack a smile and she nodded, perhaps more emphatically than she meant to. "If it's any consolation, you're kinda to blame for that happening. I was feeling super gross and she was there to pick me back up. So, y'know. Maybe we'll just call it karmatically even?"

"Fair. Um, thank you. I'll let Dana know I'm done."

Just as she was turning to leave, Victoria suddenly wrapped her arms around her in a tight hug, much to Rachel's surprise. "I'm serious. None of that stuff can get out. But also... thanks for being honest. Not everyone owns up to their stuff. I know I certainly don't..."

Only when Rachel was back alone in her car did she actually retrieve the paper to look at it. Written on it was an address and phone number, and the name of a facility. 'Northern Oregon Psychiatric Care'. "...Oh."

* * *

It had actually been quite a good deal more dramatic than Victoria made it out to be, what happened after their fateful make-out session. It was one thing to be known as Victoria, the stuck-up rich bitch. That was only fair. Guilty as charged.

But after that, and with Chloe's disappearance, people were now calling her a homewrecker. People were saying she hated Chloe, and perhaps had even had a hand in helping her go away to parts unknown.

Nathan would be leaving her soon, the Vortex Club was disbanding. The entire thing was a clusterfuck.

Those last few weeks of school, she'd spent a lot of time in her dorm room doing little else besides binging her favorite comfort anime. And also a not-insignificant amount of time crying. People ignored that for a while, which was also fair enough. Victoria certainly wouldn't have been the kind of person to check up on someone weeping alone in their dorm room. If anything, that would have been cause for more mocking.

But then, Dana was not a garbage human being like herself. And she did come and check on her eventually. She found Victoria, panda-eyed, exhausted, wearing grubby pajamas and not even bothering to hide herself or make excuses. And she drew her into a hug and let her cry more. She sat with her and pretended to enjoy stupid anime bullshit. She let her vent about how awful everyone was being without ever once pointing out that she was a pretty awful person herself.

There wasn't enough time left in the school year to properly explore any of these feelings. So they didn't. They just started hanging out and left it to everyone else to wonder and assume. When summer came and everyone was leaving campus, they promised to keep texting and stay connected online. And they did, with gusto.

The thing that finally tipped things over the edge was an otherwise boring night that Victoria wasn't looking forward to. Another big display of some promising artist at the Chase Space. She knew instinctively that whatever this peon produced, it wouldn't be half as good as the kinds of photos Victoria could offer up. Still, she had to attend. And she had to look good and protect the Chase reputation, which meant wearing a nice dress and expertly applying some tasteful makeup.

All the while, Victoria was rapidly texting with Dana, looking for any amount of relief she could get. _at least I look good. And there's always free booze at these things that my parents don't care if I drink._

_Can I see?_

Victoria smirked and chose to play a bit coy. _i mean, i can send you a shot of the spread when i get to the gallery... or did you want to see what this asshole's artwork looks like?_

A string of emojis greeted her, which seemed like the only reasonable way to respond to that garbage. Rolling eyes, a dress, some fire, and a question mark.

So she snapped a quick picture of herself in the mirror. Then she inspected it closely and decided it wasn't nearly good enough. She took another one, trying a little harder to pose this time, which felt even more gross and weird. For some stupid idiot reason, Victoria wanted to hear Dana's actual opinion, unaffected by any filters or careful posing. She captured a static image of herself, standing plainly, phone held straight in front of herself. With hands shaking slightly, Victoria sent the picture to Dana. She knew it was stupid to be nervous about this. Dumb and idiotic and gay. She was so gay, holy shit.

The message she got back said it all. _!!!!!_ There was a beat, and then Dana added, _You look so fucking gorgeous._

Victoria was grinning like crazy. m _aybe when fall rolls around I'll find an excuse to wear it again~_

The pause that followed was long, achingly so. For what seemed like an hour, all she saw was those three fucking dots, as though Dana was writing and then erasing and then rewriting whatever came next. _Wasn't talking about the dress._

The original plan for the evening was to get absolutely sloppy drunk and be a bitch to anyone who chose to talk to her. Instead, she got reasonably drunk and gave Dana a running commentary of all her judgments with corresponding pictures.

_ooh a picture of moldy fruit mocked up to look like a classic still life. Deep. So smart.  
oh hey, a romantic portrait of his husband. So progressive. Much gay. Give me a wife and I could do a way better job.   
ugh, I might throw up. This one is actually... decent... _(This was followed by several puking emoji) _  
that last one was clearly a fluke, because here's a close-up of a goddamn flower  
pffttttt look at me i found a tall spiral staircase and took a photo pointing straight down. fuck off._

Shockingly, Victoria was kind of sad to see the evening come to an end. Bitching to Dana had been the most fun she'd ever had at one of these events. She wanted to do this all the time. And that thought made her realize she was an idiot and there was a very simple answer to her problem.

_...you can tell me if im barking up the wrong tree here...  
you wanna go on a date when were back at blackwell?_

Victoria was expecting another moment like earlier, where the three dots hovered there on her screen forever. But the reaction she got was instantaneous and enthusiastic. _OMG uhhhh yeah! I was literally just trying to figure out how to ask you the same thing!_

When the fall semester started, they went out for dinner almost the second they were able to. And since then, they'd been attached at the hip. She still missed her best friend, and she wished the Vortex Club hadn't disbanded the way it did. But she had this, at least. She had Dana. In what could have otherwise been a shitstorm of a garbage year, there was something good in her life.


	7. So Depraved and Evil

Max knew that she was being ridiculous. It was pure superstition to believe that this was somehow the big moment. This Nathan guy might have nothing for them, or yet another tiny breadcrumb that would take them weeks to figure out. There was just no way of knowing. But there was something ominous in the air.

Thankfully, the building didn't exacerbate things. One would expect any sort of mental health facility to look like the ones in horror movies and ghost hunting shows. But Northern Oregon Psychiatric Care was quite modern. Rather than being built vertically in a terrifying gothic style, the building was a wide, single-floor thing, surrounded by greenery and even a freaking river. Rachel had done her best to explain how rich the Prescotts were, how they owned quite a lot of Arcadia Bay at this point. But here was a good picture of that money in action. You didn't end up here because you were a little bit depressed and came from a lower-middle class family. No, this was most definitely where a rich family sent their problems away.

The more she thought about it, the more Max wished that this place _was_ towering and gothic. At least then it would be honest about how awful it was.

Getting a visitor's pass wasn't easy either. Despite having an appointment, they both still had to produce two forms of valid identification, sign waivers, and pay a not-insignificant amount of money. But the two of them agreed it would all be worth it.

Which was technically true.

* * *

Nathan Prescott was not at all what Max had imagined. Somehow she'd pictured in her mind the baby version of a frat boy. And perhaps once upon a time that's what he had been. But this, whoever he was, looked sallow, and simultaneously over- and under-rested. The two girls had walked past several normal rooms for visitors, so they were surprised to walk into a more sterile one with plexiglass separating them from him. He was seated, slumped slightly in a plain plastic chair. "Rachel. You found me. When they said you were requesting a visit, I just had to say yes." His voice came out... hollow. Like there was some massive delay between his brain thinking the words and his mouth speaking them.

"What happened to Chloe, Nathan?" Rachel said, wasting no time at all with pleasantries as she planted herself in one of the chairs across from him.

He raised his eyebrows at that, if only a little, and began to smirk. "No sugarcoating then. Alright. She's dead."

"You'd better fucking qualify that statement, Prescott." Rachel was already back up from her chair, nearly sending it clattering behind her, towering over him.

"Sorry, that wasn't specific enough. I shot Chloe and she died."

Max's impulse was to go quiet and withdraw. She could really only sit there and try her best to breathe normally. But Rachel didn't have that. She slammed her palm into the plexiglass as tears began streaming down her face. Suddenly, Max realized the barrier was not only there to protect visitors from the residents, but also vice-versa. If there was no protection, her hand would undoubtedly be wrapped around his neck, choking the life out of him. You could see it in her eyes. "That's. Not. Funny."

"Not a joke. Now do you want to sit down and listen to the full story? Or is that enough for you?"

Reaching out, Max carefully touched her hand to Rachel's arm. The blonde flinched and reeled around, still looking furious. But just as quickly the fury drained from her eyes. "We came all this way. I want to hear it. I... need to hear it. C'mon."

She didn't say another word, just fetching her chair and planting her butt into it with a grunt.

Nathan shrugged in a way that was so nonchalant it actually started to make even Max upset. But then she took an extra second to examine him and finally realized what was going on here. It actually made her feel like an idiot to not put it together faster. He wasn't a criminal sociopath, standing maliciously and proudly like Hannibal Lecter. He was drugged up. A lot. He was pacified to the point of not feeling anything. Not remorse, not joy, nothing. "The first thing you need to understand is who Mark Jefferson was."

"I know who he was. He was a pretentious, talented man who disappeared last-" Rachel cut herself off as the math of the timeline dawned on her. "...what did he do??"

Max was equally baffled. Of course she knew who Mark Jefferson was! He was the reason she'd applied to Blackwell, and the knowledge that he'd already left was heartbreaking. Now, she was starting to wonder if she hadn't dodged some kind of bullet.

"Guy was a monster. Liked to drug and photograph girls. Said those pictures were better than all the rest of his art combined. And I became his protege. I thought it sounded... I don't know... hot? Exciting? Better than whatever boring shit that made up my day-to-day life. And all of it was really fun in theory. My father even agreed to support his secret hobby so long as he didn't cause any waves in Arcadia Bay. Jefferson built a whole special bunker for it."

This was all horrifying, and Max was terrified where this was going. Neither she nor Rachel said anything, just letting him go through his villain monologue.

"Chloe tried to rob me, wanted my money. And I figured I knew a pretty good way to get back at her, and also to give her some money so she'd leave me the hell alone. Kidnapping sounded like a shit-ton of work, and paying someone to play along would be so much easier. So that was the deal - enough money to pay her debts and get you two down to LA. All she had to do was come to the location and do whatever I told her. She agreed so fast..."

At that, Rachel tried and failed to stifle a sob. Max could only imagine the pain that came from the realization of just how much Chloe was willing to do to secure their future together.

"Didn't count on Jefferson thinking she 'wasn't good enough'. Said that she reminded him of all the 'faux-punk sluts from his Seattle days'." For just a moment, some actual personality shined through as Nathan shook his head and clicked his tongue. "Fucking asshole had his head so far up his ass. Anyway. We started arguing, aggressively, with Chloe already sitting there watching all of it. He drew a gun on me, I drew a gun on him... Mine was the first to go off, accidentally, and next thing I know, we have a corpse on our hands..."

Rachel's hand was balled up in a fist, and Max was definitely finding it harder to breathe now. "A corpse??" the blonde practically hissed out. "That was my fucking girlfriend, and you killed her."

He sighed again and nodded. "Sorry. Hard to understand empathy lately. My brain was already no good, and now it's all hazy from the drugs. Yes, I killed Chloe... No need to couch it in flowery language. Anyway, I was utterly losing my mind, I ended up telling my dad what happened. After all, he knew how to make problems go away, even better than Jefferson did. He moved so fast, I think he already had a contingency plan in mind. Erase any sign of my involvement, blame everything on Jefferson and turn him over to the feds in exchange for a speedy prosecution. My punishment was coming here, getting swept up under the rug. He even gave Joyce Price a big chunk of money under the guise of condolences for something so awful happening in 'his town'. Hell, he even knows that if David Madsen ever decided to start playing detective, he could ensure the jackass never gets to join the police force like he so clearly wants. Everything neat and tidy."

"What about us? Is he gonna make us go away too?" Max figured that there wasn't much they could do to stop it happening, but at least they could have some foreknowledge of how bad they were screwed.

"You're too small," Nathan said with a complete lack of either compassion or disdain. It was simply a fact to him. "The local news won't listen, the cops won't listen. The most you could do is... what, spread rumors? Dad feels invincible, and he has good reason to. I'm sorry, but I think this is the dead end."

Rachel's brow furrowed. "And what if I said I was recording this entire conversation and I was going to send it to anyone who will listen?"

Again, he just shrugged uselessly. "Nobody's going to believe a crazy person. But I appreciate how hard you're trying. I'd take it all back if I could. But I can't. I don't even think we'll speak again." Already he was standing up and making his way for the door.

"Do you mean that? Do you really feel bad?" Rachel called out after him, her voice trembling.

Nathan turned back with the weakest smile one could imagine. "Every minute of every day. I'm a monster too. Goodbye Rachel, and... well, sorry to meet you this way Max."

* * *

On their way out the door, Max had to stop in the bathroom to throw up. But other than that, nothing much happened. No big breakdown. No sobbing or wailing or gnashing of teeth. They drove in silence back to town, and only as they were pulling into the Blackwell parking lot did either of them say anything.

"Max... I don't... I don't want to be alone tonight..."

She nodded in agreement, sniffling softly. "Same. Come on..."

The two of them sat on the floor of Max's room, eating delivery pizza and watching pirated shows on Max's laptop. When night fell, Rachel borrowed some PJs from Max and the two of them climbed up into her bed. It was only when the lights were finally off, with Rachel snuggled into Max's arms, that the two of them both began to weep. It started with wracking sobs from Rachel that Max quickly caught as well.

"What am I supposed to do now?? What's the point of going to LA if she's not with me? Fuck, what's the point of even living in this world without her?"

Under different circumstances, Max might have been thinking clearly enough to provide a coherent response to that kind of hopelessness. Far easier was to sink into it with her. "I fucked up so hard. I can't... I-I can't believe she died thinking I was such an asshole...."

"No, Max, she still thought the world of you. I'm the one who fucked up! She was rushing to get money to prove she loved me. This is all my fault..." She let loose with another massive sob. "Max... I don't... I-I..." She looked away, staring at a particularly interesting section of wall. "I.. don't want to be alone."

"You said that earlier," Max said, not totally sure what she was trying to say.

Rachel shook her head. "No, not... I don't want to be alone. And I know it's shitty of me to demand something like that when it's also what caused this problem in the first place. But I just... I need... I need a distraction. Something, anything. Please?"

She made a good point. Max probably should have been furious at the implications there. But she was in a terrible place too, and the idea of a 'distraction' was appealing. "Fine. But only if it stops you from blaming yourself again. That's bullcrap. We can't blame ourselves for the actions of terrible peo-"

She didn't get to finish her berating. Rachel moved up against her, grasping an arm with one hand, the other clutching for her cheek, lips pressing furiously against lips. Max was distantly aware of the fact that this was her first kiss, and it was happening under the worst circumstances possible. She wondered if Chloe was looking down on them, wondering how she would feel about this.

Which was about the time Max knew that she had to get revenge. Some way, somehow. Jefferson was already in prison, Nathan was suffering. But Sean Prescott would pay. That thought was satisfying in a way she'd never expected. And before long it was fueling her actions, causing her to press closer into Rachel, knowing implicitly that she would be only too happy to help. "You're not alone... I'm here..." she muttered into the embrace.


	8. Enlightened or Afraid

Rachel woke up in a haze of several different feelings, but all of them decidedly bad. There was the obvious: grief and depression from learning about Chloe's fate. There was no small amount of hurt from what she saw as a betrayal from Nathan. He'd once been something of a friend, and now... Well. And Rachel was also feeling quite disappointed with herself for what she'd done last night. To suddenly put the onus on Max to pick her up and dust her off was the epitome of selfish. It was the same thing she'd done to Victoria. Hell, it was what she'd done to Chloe in the first place, after that whole thing with her mother! She was a piece of garbage, and it was only through very talented acting that nobody ever seemed to realize it until it was too late.

Which was why it hurt so much more that Max greeted her with another kiss as she woke up. She'd so expertly bamboozled yet another girl. And at some point she would hurt Max too and the cycle would start all over again. "Hey."

"Hey."

There was a bit of a pause and then Max looked at her bashfully. "I had an idea. And you can tell me if this is... insane and stupid, mostly because it is. I... I want to go after Sean Prescott. I want him to pay for everything he's let happen around him. And if you don't want to do that, I'll just work on it myself..."

Well, this was a decent way for her to prove that she was more than some asshole that took advantage of people. And no denying, Rachel definitely wanted to stick it to that bastard for several reasons now. But then she recalled Nathan's words from the day before and sighed despondently. "I seem to recall it's rather impossible. He owns so much of the town..."

Max nodded, offering a sigh of her own. "Yeah, I haven't forgotten..." The both spoke in such hushed tones, as though Sean Prescott even had some way of listening in to the two of them. Like he had any reason to care what they thought.

And that was when it hit her. Sean Prescott didn't care about them. He would no doubt underestimate a pair of high school girls. They could pretty much do whatever they liked and they'd never draw attention to themselves. More to the point, they weren't alone. Their hunt for Chloe over the last few days had thoroughly proved as much. None of them had many resources, but they had time and they had patience. This was their ace.

"Let's do it."

* * *

Juliet were blown away to say the least. Brooke too. Both of them, like basically everyone, had rather been hoping for a happier ending to this whole saga. But now they sat listening to a conversation between Rachel, Max, and Nathan (the two girls refused to listen through it again), and everything came into stark relief. "Holy shit..." Juliet muttered.

"Yeah. That's... fucked..." Brooke added.

They took a moment to talk everything over before checking in with the others again. Max walked in, arms crossed, immediately bouncing on the balls of her feet. Rachel was sitting on the edge of the bed, self-consciously rubbing her arm. "So... what's the verdict?"

Juliet slowly shook her head. "Well, you said Prescott owns the news and that's probably true. Unfortunately, getting a story to either be featured in national news, or go viral on its own, the fastest way to make that happen is... well. To be featured on the local news. But then again, there are exceptions in cases where the story is particularly sensational."

"Oh, sorry, is 'creepy teacher photographs drugged-up, under-age girls' not sensational enough??" Max sounded particularly stressed out, and it wasn't like Juliet could blame them.

"Sorry, that's not... Look. What I'm saying is it's possible, but not probable." Here she glanced sidelong at Brooke, begging her silently to not bring up the bullshit she was plotting earlier.

She was not so lucky. "Okay, I have an alternate plan."

"She doesn't. She has a ridiculous idea she pulled from a TV show."

"Daria was a really clever program!"

Rachel made a sound that was not quite but almost a growl. "Guys. Guys! I don't give a shit where it came from. We'll take anything we can get."

A few seconds passed with them all looking at each other before Juliet finally gave a flippant shrug. Brooke nodded and tried again. "So the premise is pretty simple. We focus on the local news stations, papers too probably. But we make an anonymous tip, tell them that the other station is breaking its vow of silence and reporting the story. Suddenly everyone's rushing to cover what happened and nobody's bothering to question it. By the time anyone figures it out, the word is already out there."

She could tell Brooke was trying her best to spin it in a way that made the most sense. But it was still pretty insane. Max and Rachel were either desperate, or actually believed her, because they were both nodding along. "Look, it's not ideal, but it's also not like that has to be our only play. We have time to work out a few different things," Rachel said softly. "A few more people to talk to, a few more schemes to concoct. We can implement them carefully, on a sliding timescale if we need to. Sean Prescott is gonna fucking pay." With all the drama of a theatre kid, she stood up and walked out of the room, Max following in her wake.

Brooke at least waited until the door shut before she leaned up against Juliet and breathed a sigh of relief. "I got chills. But also... holy shit..."

* * *

Victoria really felt as though she had been quite clear about all this. She had given Rachel whatever information she needed, and then was supposed to be left alone. Nothing brought back to her, no disturbing news. So here was Rachel at her door once again threatening to _tell her things_. The fact of the matter was that she had no illusions about what Nathan was like. They were attached at the hip, certain things stood out. He was more erratic, more distant, spending way more time on some 'special project'. And Victoria had learned from her parents that the very best solution to any problem was to push that way way way down, and save it for therapy - which you should then never attend because therapy was for the weak. Simple as that.

Right now, Rachel was threatening that very delicate house of cards. "Figured I'd said all I needed to say last time. So this better be about some assignment for class or whatever."

Immediately she put her hands up defensively and shook her head. "I know what you said, and I'm going to choose my words very carefully here. Fair?"

Victoria stared her down for a couple heavy seconds. Rachel had fucked up in the past, but she'd also apologized. She seemed to be doing... well... 'better' wasn't the right word. In fact she looked a bit tired and worn out. But she'd been very gal-pal with Maxine and perhaps that had helped take the edge off. "Fair. But I reserve the right to slap you if you step over the line."

"Sure, whatever." The concession was so immediate that Victoria's head spun a little bit. "Look, let me put it this way. You know where Nathan is right now, and you don't end up in a place like that because you come from a happy, well-adjusted home. Sean Prescott sucks, and we want to hit him where it hurts. Surely you have to be on board with something like that."

Rachel made a distressingly good point. While Victoria couldn't determine every single aspect of what made Nathan become so strange, there was no denying that the intense pressure from home shaped a lot of his being. Were she a different sort of person, she would have readily described it as abusive. Sean Prescott was the shadow that loomed over Nathan's entire life. And the idea of dealing a hefty punch to the guy had occurred to her more than once.

So she gave it a moment's thought, unsure exactly how a couple of high schoolers could even go about hurting someone like him. "I can certainly admire the viciousness. But he's hardly vulnerable. Still..." As she trailed off, Rachel's face lit up, and in spite of everything she couldn't help but want to help her. Stupid though all this might be. "I mean, hurting him financially would probably be the most painful. He's new money, like my family, which is a point of embarrassment I'm sure. And the nouveau riche tend to do a lot of investing... Based on what Nathan told me, the Prescotts don't actually have a ton of liquid cash. It's all tied up in real estate, debts, and favors. Plus, let's be real, all rich people are susceptible to the sin of pride, y'know? Wouldn't be hard to capitalize on that. But I still don't see how any of this-"

Victoria didn't manage to finish that sentence because she was already getting wrapped up in a tight hug by Rachel. "That's great, thank you." As she released her, Rachel started to shrink a little bit. "When this all shakes out, you're going to find out what happens anyway. Doesn't that change things a little bit?"

Old Victoria might have been more aggressively against all that. But being with Dana had certainly mellowed her a bit. She shrugged her shoulders and sighed sadly. "Our deal was that you couldn't tell me anything. But it would be idiotic of me to think I'd never hear anything ever. Just... do what you're going to do. Don't worry about little old me. Go on, do what you need to do."

* * *

Kate couldn't really believe what she was hearing. Like somehow Max was actually just telling her about some insane dream she'd had. But no...

Underneath the dining hall table she held Taylor's hand firmly, giving a little squeeze. Maybe she was a degree removed from Nathan, but this still had to be pretty hard to hear. "I'm so sorry. This entire thing sounds like it must have been so painful."

Max sighed softly and nodded. "It's... a lot of things. I think it's gonna take a while to untangle it. But for now, we're just focusing on the most obvious thing. Rachel and I have agreed we need to try and do something about Sean Prescott, to make him experience consequences for what he's let happen."

Kate admired her strength so much. To go through all that, and then decide to take such action. Kate wished desperately that she knew some way to help, even just a tiny bit. "I can't help but wonder just how many other people in this city want to take a shot at him too..."

Instantly, the other girl's face lit up and she gave a loud gasp, causing Kate to jump slightly. "Oh my god, you're a genius!!"

"I am?"

Taylor leaned over and pecked her softly on the cheek. "You are. Why is she a genius in this particular instance?"

"This is an entire town, filled with people who probably hate the man that owns their city. Will he still want to keep buying up buildings and businesses when people make it inhospitable for him? Could they kick him out? I mean... There's... Wow. There's a lot there to consider!"

Kate was blushing bright at this point. All the compliments, and now seeing how much Max had brightened up. She really did not understand how people had come to think so highly of her. Kate Marsh was just a shy little church mouse. That thought, however, drew her down a mental rabbit hole that gave her a new spark of inspiration. "My pastor has done a lot of sermons about greed. I wonder if maybe I could talk with him about... I don't know, some outreach, maybe... a protest?"

Taylor nodded. "Jesus did go HAM on a bunch of scam artists in the temple. Any good christian worth their salt should be willing to fight against some asshole capitalist. Well, except the corrupt ones I guess. Anyway, I'd definitely love to see that guy really suffer."

"Easy there, Robespierre, maybe let's not break out the guillotine just yet..." Kate muttered with a smirk.

There was a pause, and then Max looked back and forth between the two of them. "Okay, when we get through all of this, I need to properly gush about you guys. But for now, I need to go and talk to Rachel about this. I feel like... Wow. I feel like maybe we can do this." She picked up her tray, already making her way to the door. "You guys rock!"

Grinning ear to ear, Taylor hugged Kate tight. "We do kinda rock, don't we?"


End file.
